1. Field
This disclosure relates generally to non-volatile memories, and more specifically, to healing tunnel dielectrics of non-volatile memory cells.
2. Related Art
Non-volatile memories (NVMs) have a limited life due to a limited number of cycles, which is called endurance, and to a limited amount of time that the NVM can retain data, which is called data retention. Data retention is primarily related to how well the charge in a floating gate of an NVM cell is retained in the floating gate. There is a point at which enough charge has leaked out of the floating gate that the state of the NVM cell cannot be reliably detected. Similarly with endurance, after enough cycles of programming and erasing, charge is not easily placed into the floating gate or removed from the floating gate. The basic notion of healing is desirable because it can potentially be used to improve an NVM made using an existing process. Thus, whatever improvements made by the healing are additive to improvements in the processing. Also the particular architecture for implementing the NVM can impact how a healing technique can be used to improve data retention and endurance.
Thus there is a need to provide an NVM that improves upon one or more of the issues raised above.